Television star loses Rs 2 lakh to ATM Hackers

Mumbai, Aug 10: Popular soap actress and former Miss India Earth 2002, Reshmi Ghosh lost Rs 2 lakh after it was stolen from her account by ATM Hackers.

More cases have also been registered with the Oshiwara police after three police officers and six others complained that hackers withdrew money from their bank accounts. An FIR has been filed and the cases have been forwarded to the cyber cell, Mumbai police.

The case came to light after the actresses father deposited a cheque in Axis Branch, Kolkata, where he learnt that Rs 2 Lakh was withdrawn from the account following which the actresses father called her but she denied withdrawing any money.

Her father, Subroto had withdrawn Rs 15,000 from her account three days before the incident took place. The remaining balance in her bank was Rs 4 lakh.

"It is a joint account held by my father and me, and we have two debit cards for it. My father usually takes care of the transactions. On July 27, my father called me up to ask about a withdrawal to the tune of Rs. 2 lakh over two days. I was shocked. I rushed to the bank's Lokhandwala branch and immediately stopped all payments," said Reshmi.

A case has been registered on Aug 6 with the Oshiwara police. According to police, hackers use hi-tech equipments to copy the details of the card when it is swiped and then pass on the details to another fake card to withdraw money.

"We have registered a case, but tracing the hackers is difficult. We will now check the CCTV footage from the ATMs when the withdrawals occurred. The cybercrime department is looking into the technical aspect of the hacking," said PI Vijay Kadam, Oshiwara police station.

“We have received complaints from a few customers that cash has been withdrawn from their accounts from other banks' ATMs," said an AXIS bank spokesperson.

“While we are investigating these complaints, we would like to inform that on August 1, Axis Bank filed an FIR with the cyber cell police station at Crawford Market about the discovery of an extraneous device attached to one of its offsite ATMs in Mumbai during a routine examination.

We are providing necessary assistance to the investigating agency. Also, we will try to compensate our customers and reimburse the loss they have suffered," he said.